The Nigeria Customs Service (NCS), said operation of its officers and men at Fraiser Suit Hotel in Abuja was to remove some suspected vehicles hidden there.
The Customs’ Public Relations Officer, Mr Joseph Attah made this known in a statement in Abuja on Thursday.
Attah explained that the operation was carried out based on intelligence report that some exotic cars were taken to the hotel from cars mart to evade payment of duties.
“Our attention has been drawn to misinformation making the rounds concerning visit of our operatives to an Abuja Hotel to remove suspected smuggled vehicles.
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“Our operatives relying on intelligence that owners of some exotic cars including bullet proof without duty payment quickly removed their vehicles from a car mart and took same to Frasier Hotel, Abuja.
“On arrival at the hotel, our operatives interacted with the manager and eventually left with four vehicles, leaving six behind, while expecting the manager to provide the keys to those six,’’ he explained.
He said the manager of the hotel visited the customs headquarters Thursday morning and dropped a written undertaking to produce a Customs vehicle duty payment documents to support his claim that the vehicles were not smuggled.
“We assured him of prompt release of the vehicles as soon as evidence of appropriate duty payments is presented.
“Unfortunately, we woke up to mischievous misrepresentation, our operation has nothing to do with the guests in the hotel.
“Some even went as far as saying that the operatives went from room to rooms waking up guests to come out for vehicle verification. That is untrue.’’
He said that NCS did not engage in such thing and had no intention to start raiding hotels.
Attah emphasised that Customs operatives never infringed on the rights and comfort of guests in the hotel.
The spokesperson urged Nigerians to be wary of social media posts and also enjoined members of the public to discountenance the fabrication as Customs would continue to work in the interest of Nigerians. (NAN)